It has been quite some time since the public saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his statement in 2017 that he would no longer pursue acting, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. However, during his hiatus, his reputation expanded further.
The Mythos Surrounding His Acting Method
Primarily, this legend revolves around his preferred style of working. As someone known for immerses himself in his characters – for example, during the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked Steven Spielberg address him as “Mr. President” throughout the shoot – audiences has grown increasingly obsessed with how he works. Did he really send texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he consumed solely game he hunted during The Last of the Mohicans? And did he demand receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: have we lost interest with actorly excess?
Now, Daniel Day-Lewis has returned to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, for his new film Anemone. He is taking this chance to express his frustration regarding how method acting is viewed. “I’m a little cross these days to hear various individuals talking carelessly and using phrases like ‘gone full method’, which I think is meant to imply that someone is behaving like a lunatic in a drastic way,” he told the New York Times. “People tends to focus on the less important aspects of acting, and these elements always seem to involve some sort of self-flagellation or a situation that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or mental instability. However, in the career of an actor, it has to mainly focus on the inner transformation.”
An Industry Full of Followers
Frankly, it appears as if Day-Lewis has come out from seclusion and found himself aghast at the acting community that has been created mirroring his methods. If you’re widely considered among the best actors to ever work, and your process involves striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in solitary confinement deprived of sustenance (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that other actors will want to fill that vacuum by trying to mimic their idol.
Essentially, we exist in a landscape full of half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who strive only to demonstrate the extensive degree of dedication they put into their roles. On the milder side of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award for House of Gucci that she dedicated the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she became functionally Italian for a year and a half in preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who decided to immerse himself in the character of the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” gifts to his castmates. These items, according to various accounts, included dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, although Leto denied those worst excesses. Then, of course, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers literally managed in creating a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life to the utmost for his colleagues.
Contemporary Method Practitioners
The main practitioner of the Method at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach while filming Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the subject of a derisive New Yorker profile, full of quotes from people who were worried about his conduct (“It’s the cost on himself concerns me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I recall [him] making others to react with exasperation,” stated an anonymous cast member).
The actor says he ‘did not plan to stop acting, really’
We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, three years after that film came out. Each of these instances, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
A Noble But Uphill Fight
And, while his fightback against method detractors might be noble, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, let alone their behaviour. Perhaps if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to demonstrate what it can achieve, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply begin producing more films. Certainly everyone would get behind that.
